The Elio Is Coming The Elio Is Coming!!!!

[pistonboy]

Buckeyejake, I can't. When I'm at work, I live aboard for three weeks at a time. On here...View attachment 5741 Dang again...

I see how you got your name.

Is that for pushing river barges? I saw these many times on the Mississippi River (which I lived close to).

What river (or great lakes?).

 

[BilgeRat]

We're on the Illinois. If business isn't too good, we run the whole river, when there's lots to move, we're usually between Lemont and (roughly) Peoria, with an occasional trip to South Chicago.

My relief took the photo at Blue Island during a crew change, that's on the Cal-Sag on the way to South Chicago.

 

[Johnapool]

We're on the Illinois. If business isn't too good, we run the whole river, when there's lots to move, we're usually between Lemont and (roughly) Peoria, with an occasional trip to South Chicago.

My relief took the photo at Blue Island during a crew change, that's on the Cal-Sag on the way to South Chicago.

How is the water in the Cal-Sag since they started using it for wastewater?

 

[BilgeRat]

Water quality is actually pretty good, WAY better than it was in the mid seventies when I started out up there. MSD has built what they call SEPA pools in five locations that pump water into an elevated pool, where it then flows over several "waterfalls" to aerate the water. You can see them easily on Google Earth; the one at Sag Junction has a pool that looks like the outline of a boat's hull.

 

[Johnapool]

Water quality is actually pretty good, WAY better than it was in the mid seventies when I started out up there. MSD has built what they call SEPA pools in five locations that pump water into an elevated pool, where it then flows over several "waterfalls" to aerate the water. You can see them easily on Google Earth; the one at Sag Junction has a pool that looks like the outline of a boat's hull.

Thanks! What a perfect description of the pool. The view on Google Earth really shows how the thing works. After viewing the SEPA pool, I looked up some info that says the pools raise the dissolved oxygen levels as planned.
As for the Elio coming, I keep hoping for it to show up somewhere near me, like Memphis or St. Louis or Little Rock.

 

[Ty]

Where is that? I get interested in stuff and would like to check it out.

 

[Johnapool]

Where is that? I get interested in stuff and would like to check it out.

It is near the Waterfall Glen County Forest Preserve (a place you can look up) where the Cal-Sag canal runs into the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal. Bilgerat's description is the best way to find it. It looks like the hull of a ship, and as you zoom in on the satellite shot, you can see the "waterfalls" that oxygenate the water being pumped through it.

 

[BilgeRat]

Guys. I looked them all up on Google Earth, here's the coords.

Pool 5 41.697704° -87.946769°
Pool 4 41.678116° -87.794469°
Pool 3 41.652826° -87.678464°
Pool 2 41.662912° -87.624250°
Pool 1 41.668943° -87.561793°

Pool 2 is the smallest one; in the imagery here it's shut down and drained for the winter. Pool 1 looks like a little river with islands. Pool 3 is right by the Blue Island Metra station parking lot; on nice days, there's always people hanging around there. We've even seen wedding photos being taken there. I can't speak for the others, but I was curious as to what they had for pumps. I had some time at Sag Junction one day and took a walk around Pool 5. Turns out that the pumps there are the oldest pumping technology known to man, a bank of Archimedes Screw pumps! Who'd a thought?

If the Elio makes it to anywhere within a five hour drive from the house and I'm on days off, I'll be there, so St. Louis definitely qualifies for that. I've been strategically talking it up enough that my wife is even interested now. (Wonder of wonders!)

 

[Johnapool]

Those screw pumps handle about anything that gets through a net. I had really not thought about it until you mentioned pumps, but the screw pumps make sense. Thanks for the co-ordinates. Pretty interesting that all the pool designs are so different. No cookie cutter work there.

I'd sure like to run up to St. Louis and sit in the P4.

 

[BilgeRat]

Patience, Grasshopper. (Me too!)

I'm pretty sure that the MSD won some sort of civil engineering award for the SEPA pools. They should, they were neatly done.